Shamya Dasgupta | June, 2003

It is a well-known fact that untreated sewage is the major cause of polluted rivers, the world over. In India, this accounts for over 70 per cent pollution problem. Here is a tough, yet only long-term solution to this vexing issue.

	Ecological Sanitation (Ecosan) is based on the principle of recycling

In developing countries and especially in pockets of arid zones across the world, conventional forms of centralised sanitation are coming in for a lot of criticism these days. The reasons are many - massive investment, high maintenance and operational costs, humongous water consumption and even the larger issue of resultant pollution to rivers. In view of booming population numbers and ever-dipping groundwater levels, these factors assume critical proportions. Lastly and very significantly, sewage disposal practices in developing and underdeveloped countries divest the agricultural sector of valuable natural nourishment that human excrement could provide.

Not surprisingly then, an alternative worldview to sanitation, once confined to discussion rooms and the converted, is gaining currency in the rest of the civilised world. EcoSan - Ecological Sanitation. EcoSan is a concept that provides a more holistic approach towards ecologically and economically prudent sanitation. It is a progression from the doctrine of Environmental Sanitation, where the focus was on keeping the surroundings clean by working on wastewater treatment and disposal, vector control and other disease-prevention measures. Unlike Environmental Sanitation though, EcoSan is based on the principle of recycling. EcoSan attempts complete recovery of all nutrients from faeces, urine and greywater (kitchen and bath water) in order to benefit agriculture and minimise water pollution.

A common saying by propagators of EcoSan goes: "Where there was once a toilet, now there is a fruit-bearing tree." Importantly, the statement is based on facts and isn't just another effective baseline from advertisers trying to push through a half-baked new-fangled concept. Simply explained, EcoSan is the conversion and reuse of faeces and urine for productive ends. Conventional wisdom advises that excreta need to be dumped or disposed of. But advocators of EcoSan say that excreta, when used scientifically, could become a resource, which could be harnessed to improve agricultural yield and improve soil quality.

All that crap put to good use!

The late Steven.A.Esrey, one of the better-known advocators of EcoSan, writes, "The nutrients contained in excreta are frequently of better quality than commercial fertilisers, which have questionable consequences and are doubtful in the long run."

Esrey also marks out the three main principles on which EcoSan is based. He says, "It prevents diseases and promotes health by removing pathogen-rich excreta from the immediate environment. It is environmentally sound, as it does not contaminate groundwater or use up scarce water resources. And thirdly, it creates a valuable resource that can be productively recycled back into the environment. Over time, if stored properly, excreta, is metamorphosed from a harmful product into a productive asset."

Back home in India, director of the Centre for Science and Environment, Sunita Narain writes in her hard-hitting essay on the dangers of the present-day toilet: "We need to go back to the drawing board to reinvent a green toilet. If necessary, to go back to our past and find technological innovations which are sustainable and are equitable. So that every Indian can have access to sanitation and have clean water to drink. The alternatives to the flush toilets are emerging. These are the beginnings of the new approach of sanitation - sewerless and less water-intensive."

Discussing the situation that has emerged out of years of using the unscientific flush toilet process, Narain uses a hypothetical example: "In the flush system, water is used not just to clean the toilet bowl, but also to transport the excreta. A family of five that uses such a toilet contaminates more than 150 thousand litres of water to transport 250 litres of excrement in a year." She adds, "We must recognise that water is a precious resource and should not be used to transport faeces, that waste should be managed as close as possible to its source and that faeces and urine are resources rather than waste products."

Though the concept of EcoSan emerged first in Germany and the most significant work in that respect is being done there by the Deutsche Gesellschaft fechnische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ), we don't need to look westwards for instructions on how to proceed. Primitive forms of such toilets are being used in regions in Ladakh in the state of Jammu and Kashmir in northern India for centuries now. Also, Kerala-based EcoSan expert Paul Calvert has proved that EcoSan can work in India where water is scarce. Calvert's EcoSan toilet is the most basic form possible. It consists of a slab constructed over two vaults and the slab has a hole over each vault for the faeces to drop in and a funnel for the urine to collect. Between the two holes is a small drain over which cleaning of the anal area takes place. The anal cleaning water and the urine are then together drained into a plant bed."

There is a good reason why there are two holes instead of one - the two holes are used on a rotational basis for six months each. Before use, each hole is covered with straw to facilitate decomposition. After six months, when the turn of one hole is over, the decomposed faeces is collected and used as a soil fertiliser.

	Ecosan in progress at a site

Coordinator of the River Pollution Unit at CSE, Manoj Nadkarni spoke to this correspondent about the possibilities of EcoSan units becoming a part of our everyday life - especially in the rural areas. Nadkarni says, "In rural India, EcoSan is immediately usable. The only thing needed is a slight change in mindset, which, obviously, is more of a concern in urban India. Normal concerns would be about the stench and I can tell you from firsthand experience that there is no stench whatsoever. Faeces is smelly only when it is wet. We use ash and sand to make the faeces dry and there is no stench at all. After the six month period is over, as in the EcoSan tried by Paul Calvert, you can actually handle the faeces without getting any stench."

As for urban India, Nadkarni says, the biggest problem remains the mindset because people still feel that something like an EcoSan is a slum concept. He adds, "In places like Denmark and Germany, they are using EcoSan in multi-storeyed buildings. So why not in India? Especially when the technical expertise is readily available. It needs to be sold to the middle class. In a year or so, I think we can start building EcoSan toilets in buildings. Once the cultural hang-up of such a concept is worked out, it might be possible to go ahead."

EcoSan shows that there are alternatives available to us. It is the poor that really suffer as a result of the indiscriminate use of flush systems by the affluent few. Most deaths that result from waterborne diseases are not caused by the pathogen content in the water itself, but because of dehydration - the victims often don't have enough clean water to drink. There is also an easily established link between malnutrition and the lack of sufficient clean drinking water. EcoSan is not really new technology being brought to the light today. EcoSan is a new way of looking at things and adapting age-old options to current-day situations and conditions. The faster we, collectively, realise that the flush system is not doing anyone any good and that the EcoSan option is a more scientific and sensible option, the better it is for the world. And what's more, it would most definitely lead to cleaner rivers!

Shamya Dasgupta is a Delhi-based journalist.

For more reading, visit the following sites:
Ecological Sanitation: www.sanicon.net/titles
Environmental Sanitation: www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/ Environmental_sanit
Centre for Science and Environment: www.cseindia.org